Baltimore's 98 Rock knocked off the air by 'idiot' show host - a.k.a. Mickey

David ZurawikThe Baltimore Sun

If you have ever spilled a cup of coffee onto your computer keyboard, you need to listen to this recording of 98 Rock's morning team as it reacts to Mickey Cucchiella after he knocked a cup of coffee onto the console in the station's studio Friday morning. The station was off the air for 20 minutes, according to the show hosts.

I called Dave Hill, program director for 98 Rock and WBAL-AM, Friday afternoon about 3 p.m. in connection with another story -- WBAL's coverage of two big trials this week.

When I asked him how things were going, he replied, "How are they going? Mickey fried the board this morning -- that's how my day's going... The engineers are still working on it now, and I can guarantee you that they are finding nothing funny about it."

Hill was nice enough to send me an edited version of about eight minutes of the morning show starting at about 6:45 when the spill occurred. Listen to the mounting static and rising hysteria from Mickey as the board melts.

It takes a lot late on Friday to make me laugh -- especially when I'm writing a story about how various media outlets did and did not cover some very serious local news stories during the week

But this recording made me laugh long and hard. I think part of it is that Cucchiella sounds so genuinely contrite -- and some of his colleagues are so enjoying his misery.

The other voices heard on the recording are those of Amelia Ryerse, Lowell Melser and Scott Reardon.

Important note: The "idiot" designation in the headline comes from Mickey's self-description on the recording.

Let me be clear: He's calling himself an idiot, I am not calling him one. He's calling himself an "idiot" as he writes his own headline for the coffee debacle.